Municipal Budgets – 4 years later

Years back there was significant coverage on this blog of municipal budget deficiencies, and somewhat pessimistic predictions for the future. Although the actual news of local government distress has been kept to a minimum, the math behind the scenes stays the same. More than one year since the last post the bankruptcy of Detroit is a landmark event in this area.

We’ll be looking at this phenomenon in more depth during the coming weeks.

8) About one-third of Detroit’s 140 square miles is either vacant or derelict.

9) An astounding 47 percent of the residents of the city of Detroit are functionally illiterate.

10)Less than half of the residents of Detroit over the age of 16 are working at this point.

11) If you can believe it, 60 percent of all children in the city of Detroit are living in poverty.

12) Detroit was once the fourth-largest city in the United States, but over the past 60 years the population of Detroit has fallen by 63 percent.

13) The city of Detroit is now very heavily dependent on the tax revenue it pulls in from the casinos in the city. Right now, Detroit is bringing inabout 11 million dollars a month in tax revenue from the casinos.